Most South Korean companies trading with Japan were pessimistic over the possibility of the two neighboring countries improving their chilled ties anytime soon, despite the urgent need to do so, an industrywide survey found Monday. According to the survey conducted by the Korea Chamber of Commerce and Industry, 92.6 percent of 202 domestic companies agreed that bilateral economic cooperation was absolutely necessary to facilitate trade between the two nations. But the majority of the firms s

Hyundai Motor has reclaimed the No. 2 spot in Australian car sales, with its October car sales outpacing those of American rival Ford and Japanese rival Mazda, according to the latest data compiled by the market tracker BestSellingCarsBlog.com on Sunday. Hyundai sold around 6,200 vehicles in October in Australia, a 3 percent increase from a year prior. For the January-October period this year, its cumulative car sales reached 61,000 vehicles, up almost 10,000 vehicles from the same period last

South Korea’s biannual auto show kicked off Thursday with global carmakers showcasing sustainable, smart and sophisticated mobility to lure local drivers with future technologies designed to revitalize the pandemic-hit automotive industry. The Seoul Mobility Show offers its stage for one world premiere, five Asia premieres and 14 Korea premiers of six different local and foreign brands. About 100 car manufacturers and mobility companies from six different countries joined the show simulta

Korea Aerospace Industries announced Wednesday that it will acquire a 10 percent stake in Konan Technology, a company specialized in AI and big data. This investment in shares comes as an effort to acquire future industry-related technology by implementing AI, big data and deep learning into the aviation and defense sectors. KAI and Konan Technology will work together on developing an AI-based prognostics and health management system that can be used on Korean Utility Helicopter, KF-21, FA-50,

The Seoul Mobility Show, the only official motor show in South Korea, will kick off this Friday simultaneously at Kintex in Goyang and Paju in Gyeonggi Province as well as Seoul, showcasing 18 new cars. According to the organizer for the show, the exhibition will continue until Dec. 5 with over 100 automobile and mobility companies from six different countries taking part. The main exhibition at Kintex includes vehicles from Kia, Maserati, Mercedes-Benz, Mini, BMW, Audi, Isuzu, Genesis, Porsch

Sales of Volkswagen’s small sport utility vehicle T-Roc have been steadily growing since its launch in South Korea in January, the company said Tuesday. The T-Roc version 2022 boasts enhanced features such as a two-color design with a black roof, a new audio system and a new engine. Offered at a reasonable price around 20 million won ($16,800), T-Roc sales stand strong in the domestic small SUV market. The 2022 version comes in six body colors with a black roof and black side mirrors c

The American Chamber of Commerce in Korea and Morgan Phillips Korea co-hosted a webinar Tuesday to discuss generational disparity in the workplace with four CEOs of leading global companies. Speakers across different generations included O.H. Kwon, president of Qualcomm APAC, Robert Wilkinson, managing director of Colliers, Oh Ji-won, country chair of Shell Companies in Korea, and Tyler Joo, marketing director of global brands at AB InBbev. The moderator of the conversation, Christina Ahn, ma

Renault Samsung Motors’ sport utility vehicle QM6 is becoming a popular choice for winter travel, as it offers a silent and convenient driving experience to drivers and leaves less of a carbon footprint, the company said Monday. The SUV, powered by gasoline or liquefied petroleum gas, has been the bestselling vehicle in its category. The gasoline-powered QM6 model first introduced in 2017 recorded top sales among midsized gasoline SUVs after just a year. Gas-powered SUVs were previously

Metaverse, the fast-emerging digital platform of interconnecting virtual communities, will provide new business opportunities for budding Korean companies seeking investors for corporate growth and the complete commercialization of their products and services. In an interview jointly hosted by The Korea Herald and Hyundai Futurenet, CEOs of three companies -- Warpsolution, Digisonic and Citylabs -- said they are working on ways to develop both physical and virtual technologies to enhance the me

Energy company GS Caltex and leading chemical firm LG Chem are jointly developing technology to mass produce eco-friendly raw materials, the firms announced Thursday. The top officials of the two companies met at LG Science Park in Seoul to sign a joint development agreement aimed at developing and mass producing a biodegradable plastic material called 3HP (Hydroxypropionic acid). 3HP is an eco-friendly substance produced through microbial fermentation of glucose and amorphous glycerol. It i

SK Group Chairman Chey Tae-won will attend a Fair Trade Commission session next month involving SK Siltron, the antitrust body said Wednesday. The antitrust watchdog has been looking into SK Group’s 2017 buyout of LG Siltron for the past four years, following suspicions that the SK Group chairman’s personal purchase of a stake in the firm violated the law. In January 2017, the conglomerate acquired a 51 percent stake in LG’s silicon wafers manufacturing unit, now named SK Sil

Edible insects like fly larvae, crickets, and mealworms are hailed as a healthy and more sustainable source of protein for the mankind. But not many people seem to find them appetizing enough, at least not yet, to include them in their regular diet. For dogs and cats, it’s a different story. “Our products are loved by pets as they taste nutty and also like cheese biscuits” Kim Tae-hoon, the CEO of Foody Worm, which sells insect-based pet food, told The Korea Herald. The

Solus Advanced Materials is extending its business to North America having secured a copper foil production base in Canada. The South Korean battery foil maker previously named Doosan Solus announced Monday that it has purchased a copper foil plant site with an annual production capacity of 60,000 tons in Quebec, Canada. The factory was previously a Solus property. Established in 2001 by the firm’s European unit Circuit Foil Luxembourg, it ceased operation in 2014, when Solus was acquir

The “Coming-M 2021” metaverse conference kicked off Monday, with representatives from around 50 companies from 11 different countries taking part. Hyundai Futurenet announced Friday that it was co-hosting the interactive metaverse conference with The Korea Herald to “make an arena where global corporations, governments, and individuals preparing for the post-pandemic era can share ideas and work together.” The conference will be held for five days from Monday to Fr

Korean tech giants Samsung Electronics and LG Electronics swept the CES 2022 Innovation Awards, ahead of the year’s biggest tech event to be held in Las Vegas in January. Samsung Electronics received 43 CES 2022 Innovation Award honors, including four Best of Innovations accolades. The Consumer Technology Association, which organizes the annual convention, announced Wednesday the products and technologies across 27 sectors that received the CES 2022 Innovation Award. Samsung swept the v

A dream team with the goal of trialing commercial air taxis by 2025 demonstrated Thursday its commercial Urban Air Mobility system, or UAM. The team consists of Korea Airports Corp., Hanwha Systems, Korea Transport Institute, Tmap Mobility and SK Telecom. UAM is a new air transportation system that involves private electric aircraft taking off and landing vertically. It can travel faster than cars as it is free from traffic on land, shortening the time to reach a destination to 20 minutes fr

South Korean companies are given far fewer tax breaks compared to their counterparts in Japan and the US, a report said Wednesday. According to an analysis by the Korea Economic Research Institute, the corporate tax deduction rate in South Korea in 2019 was 8.4 percent, while the rate in Japan was 24.8 percent and 18.6 percent in the US. This means that for every 100 won of tax paid, firms in the US get 18.6 won back and 24.8 won back in Japan, while in South Korea, corporations only get 8.4

Samsung Electronics announced Tuesday that it has successfully developed the world’s first next-generation mobile DRAM LPDDR5X (Low Power Double Data Rate 5X). According to the world’s leading maker of memory chips, the 14-nanometer-based 16-gigabit LPDDR5X with enhanced speed and storage as well as less power consumption, is expected to become the optimal memory chip solution for the advanced technology industry growing exponentially with 5G, artificial intelligence and the shift t

Convenience store chain CU is exporting 10,000 dalgona, the traditional Korean sugar candy from “Squid Game,” to Mongolia and Malaysia, said its operator BGF Retail. Dalgona, an old-fashioned Korean candy made using sugar and baking soda, has become an overnight sensation after the success of the Netflix show. A total of 10,000 dalgona will be shipped to Mongolia and Malaysia, 5,000 to each country, BGF said. The product will feature four different shapes -- umbrella, star, heart

Artificial intelligence is on track to fundamentally change education, making personalized learning possible for every child, said Robert Hardman, chief technology officer of KidsLoop. In a recent interview with The Korea Herald, he also said artificial intelligence would be a necessity, not a luxury, in education in just a matter of five years. Hardman cited the example of medicine to explain the process of how AI can personalize education. “Medicine decoded the human genome that the